Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

可是，就更深一層意義而言，我們是無從奉獻這片土地的--無從使它成為圣地--也不可能把它變為人們景仰之所。那些在這里戰斗的勇士，活著的和死去的，已使這塊土地神圣化了，遠非我們的菲薄能力所能左右。世人會不大注意，更不會長久記得我們在此地所說的話，然而他們將永遠忘不了這些人在這里所做的事。相反，我們活著的人應該獻身于那些曾在此作戰的人們所英勇推動而尚未完成的工作。我們應該在此獻身于我們面前所留存的偉大工作--由于他們的光榮犧牲，我們要更堅定地致力于他們曾作最后全部貢獻的那個事業--我們在此立志誓愿，不能讓他們白白死去--要使這個國家在上帝庇佑之下，得到新生的自由--要使那民有、民治、民享的政府不致從地球上消失。

八十七年以前，我們的祖先在這大陸上建立了一個新的國家，它孕育于自由，并且獻身給一種理念，即所有人都是生來平等的。

當前，我們正在從事一次偉大的內戰，我們在考驗，究竟這個國家，或任何一個有這種主張和這種信仰的國家，是否能長久存在。我們在那次戰爭的一個偉大的戰場上集合。我們來到這里，奉獻那個戰場上的一部分土地，作為在此地為那個國家的生存而犧牲了自己生命的人永久眠息之所。我們這樣做，是十分合情合理的。